Increasing Your Cardio Workout When Skipping
When you start skipping as a cardio workout, at first even a few short minutes can seem hard to do. But then as you become more coordinated and your fitness improves, you can go for longer without feeling as much strain. After a while longer, you start finding it difficult to get your heart rate up enough to work your cardio. When you reach this stage, the answer is to start doing double-skips.
Double-skipping is done by jumping once, but rotating your skipping rope around your body twice before your feet touch the ground. If you can keep your legs straight and pike your body, you can get a bit of an ab workout while doing it. Here’s a video of me doing double-skips:
It takes a bit of practice, but once you get the technique and timing down, you’ll notice that it greatly intensifies your skipping workout. So if you ever feel like you need to increase your heart rate more while you’re skipping, you can throw in a few double-skips. Even after 3-4 you can start to feel your heart working faster.
Myself, I like to do 30 seconds straight of double-skipping at the end of each 5-min round of skipping. I find it’s a great way of working my overload capacity, which can be pretty important for competition fighting, whether it’s boxing or MMA.
We're proud to announce that Lori O'Connell Sensei's new book, When the Fight Goes to the Ground: Jiu-jitsu Strategies & Tactics for Self-Defense, published through international martial arts publisher Tuttle Publishing, is now available in major book stores and online. More about it & where to buy it.
Definitly something I also recommend to people as a way to boost fitness levels. Apart from working your fitness and burning your shoulders, its also great for timing and co ordination, attributes which a fighter can always do with improving.